


mutuality

by iroa



Category: Produce 101 (TV), X1 (Korea Band)
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, i feel very soft, platonic, predebut, they comfort each other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-23
Updated: 2019-09-23
Packaged: 2020-10-27 01:06:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20751791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iroa/pseuds/iroa
Summary: Dongpyo was by himself tonight. And what happens when one is by themselves at night? They tend to overthink.Until Hyeongjun came into the room.





	mutuality

**Author's Note:**

> This is a story of what they might have felt before debuting, everything is fictional haha.  
I usually never write, so I'm sorry for mistakes and bad wording, I'm doing my best.

The elder members spent their time outside, meeting up with their friends. Since Yohan shared a room with Dongpyo, he was all alone in his room and had time for himself. Lying on his bed, he browsed through Twitter again. Tears formed in his eyes while reading all those negative comments about himself when he heard a sudden knock at the door.  
“Dongpyo? Are you there?”  
Dongpyo hastily wiped away his tears, jumped off from the bed to head to the door and opened it himself. The brown curly haired member stood in front of the door, Hyeongjun.

“Sure, do you want to come in?” He invited him into the room.

Hyeongjun often came to their room to have fun with Yohan and Dongpyo but since the older was out at that time and everyone else was preparing to go to bed, he didn’t expect anyone to come to his room.  
“I couldn’t fall asleep, so I thought we could just chat around if you were still awake.”  
“Oh, I thought the same, I can’t fall asleep either.”

Dongpyo paused for a second.

“Are you okay, though?”

He was thinking about what he did by himself just shortly before Hyeongjun knocked on the door. Everyone was aware of the stress and pressure they all felt but respected each other’s privacy, as long as it didn’t get too bad. Sometimes, there really are things that one wanted to figure out by themselves first.

“I’m fine!!” Hyeongjun gave a bright smile making Dongpyo feel relieved. “I just wanted to talk with you.”

They both sat down on Dongpyo’s bed, leaning on the wall with their backs. They had heated conversations about what might happen after their debut, how nice it would be if they could enter the charts, about their future together as X1, about all the exciting things that were waiting for them. 

“Imagine a world tour!” Hyeongjun babbled.

“Imagine the fans cheering our names!!”

“Imagine the fanmeetings where we could finally thank some fans in person!!!”

“Right!! And the sensation of being on stage again and again,” Dongpyo added.

“The rewarding cheers after all that hard work!!”

Hyeongjun really got Dongpyo excited about all these things.  
They revised the killing parts for Flash together, pointing out the special points they noticed in the choreography. Dongpyo stood up to exaggerate his facial expression while dancing, causing the both of them to curl up and shed some tears from laughing too much. “I was thinking about the exact same thing.” Hyeongjun added while laughing and clapping. After the laughter calmed down, Hyeongjun softly rested his head on Dongpyo’s shoulder. The shorter one followed quick and leaned his on Hyeongjun’s head as well.

There was silence and they recovered from that excitement earlier. Hyeongjun took a deep breath.

“Actually…”

He muttered really slowly, as if he was still thinking about what he wanted to say, his voice somewhat trembling.

“Actually, Dongpyo… I lied a bit when I said I was fine.” Dongpyo widened his eyes, looking at the slightly younger one.

“Honestly, I can’t stop thinking about negative things. I can’t stop going on social media and read people’s opinion about me.”

Dongpyo opened his mouth to say something but he wasn’t quite sure what to say yet, so he just kept listening to him talking.

“I know, I shouldn’t think about those comments to deeply, I know I have people who will support me… But I can’t shake those thoughts off that I’m lacking in so- sooo many ways.”  
Finally, Dongpyo managed to get some of his thoughts together.  
“But Hyeongjun, you’re doing well!! I’m serious.”  
The younger boy turned his face to Dongpyo’s shoulders, small sobs became audible.

“The pressure, it’s suffocating.”  
He lifted his arm and started to stroke the vulnerable boy’s fluffy hair. He knew what Hyeongjun felt, sadly, he knew it too well.

“Can I meet their expectations? What if they don’t cheer on for me? What if I fail and drag the whole group down?”

He started to sob even louder, letting all the frustrations out.

“Dongpyo, I’m so sorry for bothering you like this, I just…-“  
“It’s fine. Just- continue, let it all out.” His voice sounded weak. He was hiding the fact that what Hyeongjun said hit himself as well.

“It’s so painful, I end up thinking that I really am not suited for this, I will end up being the fool, being the worst. I am scared.” He kept on crying. With every word that Hyeongjun said made Dongpyo remember what he had been bottling up all the time.

“I’m so sorry to everyone I disappoint, I’m so sorry for the people who wished not to see me.” And he continued yelling out everything.

After a while, Hyeongjun eventually felt something wet dripping on his neck. Was Dongpyo possibly…?

He looked up to check, just to see Dongpyo’s face with tears running down his cheeks.  
“Dongpyo!?” He was startled to see him crying. Dongpyo pulled his legs in and rested his head on his knees, not wanting Hyeongjun to see his miserable self. Why was he crying now when his friend opened up to talk about his worries? What a selfish move. He felt so bad, not being able to provide proper comfort for Hyeongjun like the other members could’ve done because he was pretty much in the same situation. But shouldn’t he know better than anyone else then?  
Hyeongjun embraced Dongpyo in a hug. Finally, Dongpyo spoke up quietly.

“I’m sorry, Hyeongjun.”  
“Why are you apologizing?? There’s nothing to apologize for.”

“You came to talk about your worries but I ended up not being able to help you in any way.”  
“That’s not true.” Hyeongjun pulled Dongpyo in for a tight hug.

“It is though. To be frank, I’ve been reading comments on Twitter too. How much I’m lacking, how I don’t fit to the group’s concept, how I’m annoying. Those comments are engraved deep in my thoughts and I think about them all the time.”

Releasing from the hug, Hyeongjun teared up again. Thinking about how Dongpyo was dealing with all of this by himself, not intending to open up to anyone about it, remembering how he was feeling when he read the hate about himself. It was too much. Too painful. Too terrible to keep it to yourself. That’s also why Hyeongjun finally decided to let his worries out. To think, that Dongpyo was struggling with the same broke his heart.

“So we were both doing this, making a mess in our head.”

Dongpyo let his tears fall. He wrapped his arms around Hyeongjun, weeping loudly into his shoulders, as if all feelings he had kept inside a box suddenly bursted out. Hearing this, Hyeongjun couldn’t stop crying either. But it was going to be fine now. Both were crying in each other’s arms, being comforted by mutual pain and mutual thoughts. They knew they had each other.

After they calmed down, they let go, locked their eyes and gave a weak but genuine smile. Seeing the huge tear-soaked spot on each other’s shoulders, Hyeongjun mocked him.  
“You cried a lot, huh? Well, I’m surprised the others didn’t come in to check why you were crying so badly.”  
“Shut up, you were crying just as loud as me, crybaby.” Dongpyo pushed Hyeongjun lightly and both of them started to laugh again.

“Thank you, Dongpyo.”  
“For what? I didn’t do anything. Rather, thank you for listening to me too.”  
“We both had our share.” Hyeongjun giggled.

It’s not like their problem was solved, but it felt like a relief they could share the same feelings. Both calmed down from the huge scene earlier and started to feel sleepy.

With sore eyes, Dongpyo leaned his head onto Hyeongjun’s shoulder.

“Hey, Dongpyo…” he paused again.

“Can I sleep here tonight?”  
“Awh, are you feeling lonely?” He teased him but agreed immediately. “Alright, stay here.”  
They lied down next to each other under the blankets and were still talking for a bit before they fell asleep comfortably and safe.

A bit later, Yohan entered the room quietly, expecting Dongpyo to be asleep already, but to his surprise, Hyeongjun was lying right next to him, sleeping very close to each other. His heart felt really warm, knowing that they comforted each other through the night.

“They finally opened up, huh?”

**Author's Note:**

> I love them both so much, I hope they're doing well.  
I just kinda had to write something to calm down from all the stupid tweets I'm reading.  
Please leave your thoughts in the comments, kudos, whatever, thank you <3
> 
> update 24/10: I finally created a twitter account so follow me! @iroapyo  
We can just casually talk, I sometimes tweet too~!  
See you next time!


End file.
